Ron Judd's Olympics Insider

Ron Judd, an Olympics junkie and Seattle Times columnist who has covered Olympic sports since 1997, will use this space to serve up news and opinion on the Summer and Winter Games -- also inviting you to chime in on Planet Earth's biggest get-together.

10. "A" and "B" samples for all of them came back positive for Skittles.
9. Constantly napping during floor exercise.
8. Still waiting for that pre-teen growth spurt to push them over 3 feet.
7. To stick the landing from a rings dismount, they need a permission slip from Mom.
6. Distinctive "Wheeeeeee!" can be heard during airborne portions of vaults.
5. Chinese Olympic officials pushing hard for new demonstration sport in London 2012: Synchronized Monkey Bars.
4. Absolutely can't stop giggling while peeing into dope-testing beaker.
3. For kicks, often tie their coach to his chair with those rhythmic gymnastic ribbons.
2. One of them recently appealed his bedtime to international Court of Arbitration for Sport.
1. After practice, they go straight back to the Nike factory floor.

Note: Surely this, coupled with all the excellent FREE TIBET comments attached to the posts below, is enough to get us censored from Chinese Internet servers. If not, well, there's just no injustice anymore.

Another story on the IOC's clearly dirty fingers in the Beijing censhorship scandal is here.

Actually, we have mixed feelings about this. Clearly the Chinese reneging on (yet another) promise is infuriating. But journos arriving at the Media Center to find some Web access blocked should consider the upside, like mysteriously missing emails and directives from editors back home in the states:

"Huh? You wanted me to cover the synchronized swimming prelims last night instead of the basketball gold medal game? Never got the note. It's those blasted Chinese censors!" And so on.

And we will close by saying: Tibet. Tibet. Tibet. Tibet. Tibet. TIbet. Tibet. Tibet. TIbet. Tibet.